VISIONARY FOOD

An obsession with great cheese started around 25 years ago for Nick Haddow when he was given a bucket of fresh goat’s milk whilst working as a chef in South Australia’s Eden Valley.

rom that moment, Nick chased cheese around the world, spending ten years working with specialist cheese makers in a number of different countries, before eventually landing along with his partner Leonie on the stunningly beautiful Bruny Island in Southern Tasmania.

One of the strongest champions for artisan cheese in Australia and a vocal advocate for raw milk cheese, it is here on Bruny Island that Nick founded Bruny Island Cheese Co in 2003. What started out as a factory and cellar door experience has morphed into a veritable juggernaut, with Nick realising his vision of supplying Bruny Island Cheese Co with milk from his own dairy farm, in addition to more than a few other projects along the way.

In 2017 Nick started Glen Huon Dairy Co, acquiring a now organically certified farm that is home to some (very happy) rare breed cattle, and sole supplier of milk to Bruny Island Cheese Co. As if that were not enough, Bruny Island Beer Co was also established around the same time, making beer that much like their cheese, is an artisanal product that strives to be the best expression of the seasonally variable ingredients available in the region. Or in layman’s terms… for cheese makers they make bloody great beer!

Nick’s products have a strong presence in Tasmania and across the country. He has a cellar door in the Salamanca Arts Centre, a stall at the iconic Salamanca Market, and large cheese club membership, who receive regular deliveries of cheese dispatched all over Australia from Bruny Island. At the heart of his operation is a cellar door on Bruny Island, where guests are invited to visit for an authentic cellar door experience.

Visitors can stay for a bit and enjoy a free sampling of cheese and beers, watch the cheese being made and have a chat with the cheese makers and brewer. For those wanting to stay awhile, there is a selected dine-in menu that showcases what Bruny Island Cheese Co do best.

With seating under the eucalypts guests can indulge in a cheese platter or a long, lazy lunch across a menu designed to showcase their products, meaning you can expect lots of cheese options and beer, including cheese platters, baked cheeses and delicious toasties!

A true visionary, when Nick isn’t busy on farm or at Bruny Island Cheese Co, he maintains an active schedule of media engagements and community work. In the quintessentially Tasmanian generosity of spirit, Nick spends much of his time promoting the island state and supporting, showcasing and mentoring many other artisan producers and agri-food businesses.

Nick’s passion for small island living resulted in him being awarded a Churchill Fellowship in 2014 to study small island economies around the world. Nick was also a co-presenter of all six series of Gourmet Farmer, which is screened in Australia and around the world, and he has co-authored several books, with his most recent Milk.Made published internationally and awarded a prestigious James Beard Award in 2017.

For many on the outside looking in, Nick’s unrelenting quest for new knowledge and ideas, and drive to see his latest vision come to fruition seems (impressively) exhausting, but for him it is all in a day’s work. He is the embodiment of the notion that Tasmania is an island of endless possibilities and Tasmanians are people who cut their own path… and through hard work and vision, achieve extraordinary things.